


Sidelines

by AfflictedwithAlliteration



Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Darker Themes than Canon, F/M, Fluff, Mutant Reader, Named Reader, POV Second Person, Reader-Insert, Romance, TMNT 2k12 - Freeform, Temporarily Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-05
Updated: 2018-09-05
Packaged: 2019-07-07 08:44:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15904857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AfflictedwithAlliteration/pseuds/AfflictedwithAlliteration
Summary: When you're kidnapped by Snakeweed it sets off a chain of events that tear your normal life apart.  With your life hanging in the balance you're forced to choose between the world you grew up in and the world the turtles show you. But neither decision is without consequences and neither decision will give you a happy ending.





	Sidelines

The bell dings repetitively as you skip in to the laundry mat, stale soap and the stink of New York water filling your nose. 

“Early as usual.”

“Gotta bounce early today, bossman, tests to study for and all that jazz,” you say in lieu of greeting, dropping your change of cloths behind the desk as you look at the few people lingering. Thankfully no one had been able to sneak in a last load, the dryer lights blinking the last half hour of loads. “Mind if I start early?”

“Knock yourself out, kid.”

Smiling in thanks, you grabbed your bag to change into your old t-shirt and leggings, stuffing your school clothes away haphazardly then you pull out your headphones. You’re already belting out the lyrics before you press play, grabbing a trash can, spray bottle, and some rags as you head to the first washer to clean it out.

* * *

“Ooohhh! Free money, baby!” You grin as you pull your dust covered head out from the lint catch, pocketing the twenty. You always made out with a few dollars but a twenty meant you were set for at least the week…or maybe just the night, you thought as your stomach rumbled. Even more hungry now that you could sneak a midnight snack before heading home you hurried to put away the dryer, giving the floor a final sweep. Lights off, you grab your bag to dig out the key from your school clothes, which is why you don’t see it coming. 

You probably wouldn’t have seen it anyway, headphones still in, eyes focused on making sure you lock up correctly. When you look down at your waist, the tight green vine wrapped around you, theres no reaction. Not at first. Not until it yanks you back, key and bag slipping from you fingers with a crash as the dark of the street swallows your screams. 

* * *

The screaming stopped only when you’re voice went hoarse, and even then you tried right up until you reached some sort of garden. Or something. The odor that hit you was fouler than any sewer you’d crawled through but the stench was the least of your worries when the thing that had you started to lower you towards some sort of plant soup thing. You struggles renewed but it made no difference as you felt the liquid creep up your hair, the power to scream coming back even as the fluid filled your lungs.

* * *

The stench is stronger than before, but its coming from you. It’s still not your main concern when you wake up on the floor, a few other people groggily wiping slim from their eyes. You struggle to stand, not to vomit, eyes taking in the creepy room briefly before you follow the others. 

It doesn’t take long to realize you all have no idea where you all are supposed to go. Theres no light, everyone is exhausted, no ones phones work, and no one seems to know the way out of the sewers. But it’s not you who suggests going back to reorient yourselves but you do follow, the dark and the stench of sewers still not quite preferably to the strange goop room you’d been in. 

That turns out to be a mistake.

One woman faints while the others run immediately, crying out in horror as they go but you can only stare dumbstruck. You back up unconsciously, unable to comprehend the giant…praying mantis? That is fighting…lizards? Dinosaurs? What was in that goop?!

When one of them goes flying, crashing hard enough for the sounds to vibrate in your ears you finally turn and flee with the last of the stragglers. 

* * *

Four days.

“Four days?” You croak out, leaning up in the hospital bed in disbelief as your mom nod and eyeing the machines warily as if you could pass out at any moment. She wasn’t wrong though. The doctors said how you were half dead by the time you’d all arrived, apparently some of the people you’d been with actually were dead. No food or water for four days. Not to mention the lack of motion, it didn’t seem like that long but apparently the human body did not appreciate your comatose state. When you’d woken everything felt heavy and thick, the adrenaline from you escape long since warn off letting you feel the bruises that littered every, a heavy deep green and purple spattered across you. “I look like a bad abstract painting.”

“This is nothing to joke about!” 

“It’s not even a joke, have you seen my arms?” You retort, holding up the battered limb weakly as your mother gives you a wan look.

“Once you feel a bit better the—the police will want a statement.”

“Oh.” You had heard they were treating it as a some special investigstion, whatever that meant. There wasn’t any information you could give them anyway. Flashes of green, the sickeningly sweet scent in the goop soup, the bodies and how they had practically melted at your—“Can I have a hug?”

Your mom wraps you up as gently as possible, moving herself up onto the bed to hold you as tightly as your body will allow. It reminds you of when you were little, the thunder roaring outside so loud only the sound of her heartbeat could drown it out. It did the same now, your shoulders sagging with unnoticed tension until your mind finally drifts away from the horrid thoughts. 

* * *

“Home sweet home.” You sigh out, as your mom opens the door, your dad pushing you up the stairs carefully while you groan with impatience, “Come on, dad, I’m practically all better now!”

“You’re still banged up!” Comes the annoyed retort, and you can understand why but that doesn’t stop you from complaining. You hadn’t even wanted to be wheeled but the doctors had insisted and you dad seemed insistent on following their instructions to the letter. 

“A little bump won’t kill me.” You mutter sulkily as your neighbor watches your family with interest, making you slink down and wishing you’d worn a cap. Now it was going to be all over school that you had to be wheeled out the hospital. A whiney moan escapes your lips when your dad purposefully goes slower when he notices her too.

“Karma for complaining.”

“That’s not how karma works!”

* * *

The…hair just grows back defiantly, the razor no match for whatever it is. You want to tell your parents, you want to scream, you aren’t sure what you want to do but the only thing you can do is mechanically pull your sleeve down to cover the rest of the patches. Thankfully only the bruises on your arms had grown them, the bruises on your legs weren’t faded but at least stayed as bruises. Or what you thought were bruises. The doctors had no idea what it was, and the cops had thought you were crazy when you tried to tell the truth so you just said you were making up stories because you didn’t remember. 

But you did.

Specifically you remember the squish of mulch beneath your bare feet—bare feet that had—oh God—

“Mom!” You shrieked, voice ringing out through the house like a fire alarm. 

* * *

“Ma’am—please, we understand—“

“You don’t! She’s sick and you aren’t doing anything to help her!”

“We are running tests, we can’t just administer something when we don’t know the cause. I promise—“

“What good did your promises do us last time?” You hear your dad shout, slamming the door shut, effectively cutting off the rest of the tirade. But you can still see the doctors from the bed, watching as they point and wave, security showing up soon after. Unable to watch you close your eyes, letting sleep claim you.

* * *

You dream of green. 

Grass.

Trees.

Water.

The sky.

All of it is green, filling your lungs, seeping into your ears. It chokes you as you search for something to grab onto, only find more green. 

Green.

Green.  
Green.

Green hands.

Pulling you free until you see the sliver of darkness in the green. 

The shriek of a monster behind you.

A lizard in front of you but then it’s shoving you until you’re both flying through the air, the sudden dark colored pavement rushing up to meet your face—

The scream you let out wakes you up, along with the sending the nurse running in until you assure her it was just a nightmare. Something else that doctors assured you would fade with time. But you weren’t worried about it because it had given you an idea. 

If the doctors didn’t know what was wrong with you, maybe the monsters did.


End file.
